Bear Witness
by GylzGirl
Summary: The thoughts of those standing back stage after "Spectacular, Spectacular"


Bear Witness  
  
by GylzGirl  
  
Rating: PG  
Disclaimer: 20th Century Fox and Baz Luhrmann own Moulin Rouge and all its inhabitants. I am a penniless writer and this story isn't changing that.  
Summary: The thoughts of those watching Christian cry over Satine.  
Author's Notes: Thoughts are denoted by // this // . Karen, my beta, how wonderful life is now you're in the world :)  
Written: August 2001  
  
******  
  
  
Hundreds of eyes watched them from the darkness. Watched the two figures entwined together on the stage floor. The couple cut a contrast to the carpet of red and white rose petals that littered the ground around them. White as her costume. Red as her blood.  
  
Teary eyes blinked at them from a once Magical Sitar. // It wasn't supposed to end like this! The tears are biting at my eyes. I don't want to see. To see Christian rocking his shattered Diamond, as if the movement would somehow conjure her back. My hands cover my ears. I don't want to hear his suffering, his soul naked in his grief. These two taught me. They taught me that this blessed magical thing called love that I had read about all my life could be real. It was like showing a devout man the face of God. I always knew in my heart that it existed but to have it appear before me, tactile and real as the penniless writer and the beautiful courtesan that it had found purchase within. It was an Epiphany. It was not supposed to end like this!//  
  
Dark eyes lined in kohl observed them. // It had to end this way. I told him, told them all, it would end bad. And now that it has, here I am, held immobile by my shock and sadness. I told myself it would end bad. I should have listened. Passion is everything. Beyond reason and logic, passion is life. I stand, mute witness to a murder. I watch as sorrow suffocates the flame of passion that Christian has always been. To think, if only I had never climbed that ladder. If only I hadn't had a sleeping spell and fallen through the floor. You were smart to leave Audrey.//  
  
Bright eyes stared out from behind rectangular glasses. // How could it have ended this way? This discordant note as the finale of such a beautiful love song? Two things are supposed to last forever. Love and Music. But how can the music continue when the singer is silenced and the writer's dreams are crushed? How can the love continue when Satine is dead and Christian will close himself off to everything but the pain of her loss? I can already see that happening in how he clings to her desperately. He knows she is gone. He also knows that once she leaves his arms, he has to look past that moment. Look at a future without her. Never see her, hear her, touch her again. Only in his dreams.//  
  
Burning, reddened eyes peered out from the face of a pretend Maharajah. // It's over now. Everything. My precious Cherub. My Sparkling Diamond. My little Satine is dead. The Moulin will follow her shortly. Strangely, right now I will be relieved to see it go. I told her that we cannot afford to love. Why did I not listen to that myself? I was never supposed to care about her, tried to never let her know. The show must go on. And it did. No one will look away from the two of them. They are on a stage and if we can just focus on the tableau they make, it's not real. The princess will awaken with a kiss from her beloved. The actress will stand and take a bow, leaving the stage hand in hand with her suitor. If we see each other, see our own horror mirrored back to us in the faces of the others, it becomes real. No one here is ready for that.//  
  
The glasses of the conductor began to fog with the humidity of unshed tears. // Now there is no music except for the nearly rhythmic sobbing as Christian laments his Satine. It's so very quiet save for his cries. Everyone is frozen, afraid that the slightest sound that acknowledges the living would be disrespectful as this beautiful boy's world comes crashing down around his feet.//  
  
The Sitar squeezed his eyelids shut for a moment, trying to force the stinging liquid over the edges. // We all stand in silence. Too horrified to move. It was not supposed to end like this! Our Spectacular Spectacular was to end in a shower of rose petals, not tears. Love was supposed to conquer all. Happily ever after. Somebody made a correction to the script. They gave their hearts to each other. And I gave my heart to them. I became brave in their shadow, a soldier for the righteousness of their love. Now the war is lost. The Children of the Revolution orphans. It was not supposed to end like this!//  
  
Zidler tilted his head down but his gaze remained focused. // I should have told you sooner Chickpea. You had the right to know. You both did. I should have done so much more. I should have done so many things.//  
  
Toulouse bit the inside of his lip to keep the sounds of his grief from escaping his mouth. // Why didn't I see that she was sick? I could tell she was still in love with him even after she turned him away. I knew that. Why didn't I know this? Perhaps I could have prepared him. No. I don't think anything could have done that.//  
  
The Argentinean's mouth formed a thin unhappy line. // I could see she was sick. I just didn't know how bad it was. Should have known. Should have guessed. She fainted too often. Perhaps they should have known too. Perhaps my frequent lapses of consciousness gave hers an air of normalcy.//  
  
Satie silently clasped his hands before him to try to stop their shaking. // Satine saved his life a second time tonight. Hearing his cries echo backstage, I know in my heart he would have thought to take his own life had she not extracted that one last promise that he go on. //  
  
Toulouse slowly reached a gloved hand up to wipe his wet cheek. // If this sitar had any real magic, he would give his own life to give her back to her poet. He will drink himself to death. And I won't be able to stop him. All I can do is drink more than him, faster than him, so that I won't have to see my other beautiful star fall from the sky in a streak of fire. And now he will write of their love as she has commanded. And someone will read the words on the page. And it will make them believe in love.//  
  
The Argentinean inhaled slowly, trying to calm his warring emotions. // Tell our story she asked. He tells their story already. Tells it in the soul-shattering sobs that wrack his trembling body. Tells it in the river of hot salty tears that drench his face. Tells it in the strain of his muscles as he holds her lifeless body to him, as tight as he can. Their story was one of love, and dreams, and a future cut short by a cruel twist that even the quick as lightning plotting of the writer could never have predicted.//  
  
Zidler pinched his lips together tightly. // I tried to make things up to her too late. I kept her from the arms she rests in now. I kept her from the love she wanted so badly. I stole their last happy days from them and I will never forgive myself for it. The show went on. Gosling please forgive me one day. I will tell him everything. Tell him how you loved him. What you were prepared to give up to save him. I'll make sure he understands it all. Yes Satine, my sparrow, he does love you. He does. I see it. If only he'd really been a Duke.//  
  
After a time, no one knew how long, everything became still and quiet. The slump of Christian's body told the tale. He had cried out everything he had within him and now lay on the floor, tangled with his departed beloved, unconscious.  
  
At that instant, the motionless crowd began a slow choreography to a silently playing dirge. The peripheral company disbursed throughout the many walkways of the backstage maze. Soon, only the featured players remained on the stage.  
  
Zidler led Chocolat from one side of the room while Christian's four friends approached from the opposite. Kneeling on the floor, Chocolat sat his ornate headdress on the ground and placed his arms around his lifeless charge. His large sad eyes lifted to meet those of the Argentinean.   
  
Nodding silently, the bearded man assumed a similar posture behind Christian. Satie and Toulouse knelt by the boy's side as well. Carefully, they reached around him and gently loosened his arms from around Satine's body while the Argentinean held him.  
  
Once she was free of her lover's embrace, Chocolat lifted her effortlessly into his arms and stood towering over the raven-haired poet and his cadre of loving friends. Slowly, quietly, he carried her away from the stage followed by Zidler and Marie.  
  
Toulouse folded Christian's arms against his own chest , then leaned over his friend and kissed his forehead. Satie stood and helped Toulouse to his feet. The Argentinean scooped Christian up and stood unwaveringly. They completed the procession as it left the stage.   
  
At the end of the hall, the two parties went their separate ways. Satine was taken to her dressing room. Christian was carried from the Moulin Rouge to his flat across the street.   
  
For the second time that night, his friends lay him carefully in his bed, undressed him, and tucked him in. The rest of the night they took turns sleeping, keeping vigil, and holding him as he cried out in his sleep.  
  
A few hours after dawn, a knock came upon the door. Satie crossed from the chair quickly, lest the noise wake Christian. The opened door revealed Harold Zidler to the room's surprised occupants. In his hands, he held Christian's pawned typewriter.  
  
Zidler walked over to the table by the window which up till the night before had been the typewriter's resting place. By this time everyone had noticed Christian sitting up in the bed. He looked haggard and his normally bright eyes were dull and reddened. He said nothing, merely meeting Zidler's glance. His four friends looked back and forth between the two men.  
  
Zidler shrugged. "Of all the things she wanted, it was the only thing I still had it in my power to give her. It was the least I could do. The very least."  
  
Christian nodded slowly then lay back on the pillows and turned his back to the door. Zidler set the typewriter on the table and left the room. Toulouse made his way to the bed, sitting on the side and wrapping his arms around Christian as the young writer began crying anew. 


End file.
